Best Affiliate Marketing Strategies for Monetizing Your Blog

Affiliate marketing is a system in which a company pays marketers (affiliate) for each customer or visitor brought to the company’s site by the marketer(s) efforts.

More simply, the affiliate gets paid for each buying customer that he brings to the company’s site. It is a simple system that anyone can do. You don’t need to know how to make a site or code to get started, though they can help you if you do. It is a way to make some extra bucks or a full time salary if you work hard at.

The great thing about it is that, you can do it without leaving your bed. You can finally be your own boss. You can set your working hours. It just depends on how much you want to make. If you work more you will make more and less if you work less, duh. I am going to teach you the system. The rest is up to you.

The system is broken down into a simple four steps process which are:

1. Customer visits affiliate’s website or article page.

2. Customer becomes interested in the product and is directed to the company’s website

Each affiliate is given a unique “affiliate link” to direct the potential customer to the site. This link is a tracking device so the company knows which affiliate brought in which customer. You can get as many affiliate links as you want; meaning you can promote as many products as you want. There are thousands upon thousands of companies out there with affiliate programs so don’t worry about running out things to promote.

Recommended Resource: The Affiliate Marketing Master (eBook)

The upside of affiliate marketing is that it’s simple. If you’re established as an expert in your industry, you likely already tell people what products and services you use in the course of your business. You’ll continue to do the same… only now you’ll get paid for it!

Here are 4 Very Popular Affiliate Sites:

You can also do a Google search on the niche you are blogging, along with “affiliate programs,” e.g: if your blog is about “online dating” then search this: “online dating affiliate programs” to see the numerous affiliate programs available for you in this niche. When promoting products through affiliate programs, I want you to consider these 3 factors:

1. Only promote products you believe in

If you start promoting any product under the sun, whether or not you’ve tried it yourself, you’re going to lose credibility and trust with your audience. You want them to believe that you have their best interests in mind – and that means only recommending products you have a good understanding of and trust.

2. Give value

To have a viable business, you must offer value. How can you make it easier on your readers to buy the products they want and need? Can you give more details so they can make informed buying decisions? Can you offer coupons or tell them where to get the best deals? Or maybe you can perform a full review of the product so they can evaluate products before they buy. Figure out a way so you’re adding value to the purchasing process.

3. Promote the products

You can’t just throw up a bunch of links or even review posts and expect to see massive traffic and sales. Instead, actively promote your affiliate links through social media, article marketing, and more. For instance, if you write a blog post comparing two popular vacuum cleaners, link back to the post from other blog entries and promote it on Facebook, Twitter, Forums, Googleplus and YouTube.

That’s a great description of affiliate marketing. The reason I like the concept is that it’s one way you can test a market before going to the expense of developing your own product and finding no-one wants to buy it (like I did when I first started out online LOL)

I know exactly how you will feel when you created a product and no one wants to buy from you. I will advice you secure the attention of those men/women out there who have made name for themselves in the e-commerce sector to put their pen down for you. If any of such can write the forward for you why not.